Sabrent Rocket Pro Portable SSD Review

Sabrent is on a tear, offering some of the best SSDs currently on the market; from the E16 powerhouse Rocket NVMe 4.0, to three models covering their portable SSD lineup.

With both the Rocket Nano and XTRM on the books, it was time to check out the Rocket Pro. The Pro is the larger sibling of the Nano, using a similar width for the enclosure that has now been stretched out to accommodate and 2280 NVMe solution.

As with the Nano, the Pro is a Gen 2 USB 3.2 solution, connecting over the USB-C connector. Performance is slated for 1000 MB/s across several capacities, including 1, 2, and 4TB at the top and 256 and 512GB at the bottom. Compatibility includes both Windows and macOS platforms.

MSRP of the 4TB Sabrent Rocket Pro comes in at $899.99 with a one-year warranty that you can bump to two-years if you register within 90-days.

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The metal case packaging has been pushed over to the Rocket Pro lineup, exactly as we found with the XTRM and Nano. Capacity is listed bottom right.

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On the back, we find features and package contents listed along with model info and capacity once again.

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Unboxing, the Pro is set up with both USB-C and USB-A cables.

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The enclosure is a two-piece aluminum design, USB-C, on the bottom, as seen above.

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The bottom uses silicon feet not to scratch up any surface it may be on.

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CDM is a staple in performance testing; version 7 has seen some updates in the workloads used for testing. Starting our test run, we see the Pro touch 1016 MB/s read, and 1040 MB/s write in sequential. 4KQ1 comes in at 21 MB/s read 40 MB/s write.

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ATTO shows the limit of the interface quite nicely. 512K through 64M, the Pro is stonewalled by USB 3.2 Gen 2 at 996 MB/s read and write.

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New to our testing is a 200GB data transfer that aims to weed out drives that lose performance during backup scenarios. The Rocket Pro did terrific in this test, handling all 200GB in 5.7 minutes at 650 MB/s.

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Price/Performance is a bit rough on the 4TB Rocket Pro; the high cost does no favors and lands this solution at 80%.

Sabrent is really on a roll delivering reliable products at a real value for consumers. This continues with excellent build quality in the Rocket Pro, a full aluminum design backed by proven NVMe solutions.

The performance was somewhat surprising in a few tests, mainly the 200GB transfer, where it outdid even the Thunderbolt 3 model, Rocket XTRM. In sequential canned benchmarks, we were able to reach the limits of the interface at 1040 MB/s, and moving into ATTO, we see a clear wall being hit at 512K.

Pricing isn't very kind for the 4TB Rocket Pro as it's well past the sweet spot that 2TB solutions provide. As a matter of fact, you can pick up two 2TB Rocket Pro drives that offer the same build quality and performance for $250 less than this one 4TB model, but for those that want a single drive 4TB portable SSD, Sabrent has you covered.

Tyler's Test System Specifications

• Motherboard: ASUS Crosshair VIII Formula X570 (buy from Amazon)
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 (buy from Amazon)
• RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16GB 2x8GB DDR4 3600 (buy from Amazon)
• Cooler: Corsair Hydro H60 (buy from Amazon)
• Case: Corsair Carbide 275R (buy from Amazon)
• OS Storage: Corsair MP600 1TB (buy from Amazon)
• Power Supply: Corsair RM850x (buy from Amazon)
• OS: Microsoft Windows 10 (buy from Amazon)